1. Field of the Invention
This invention is directed to an orienting assembly or tilting mechanism designed to be used primarily with a pick-up head designed for the loading and emptying of large bulk containers in which citrus and like fruit is loaded, and transported from the fields to trucks or the like for transporting to packing or processing facilities.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In the harvesting of fruit and particular citrus type products it is commonplace for the fruit to be transferred to large bulk containers disposed at various locations throughout the field of harvesting. These containers are, when filled, picked up by a boom type pick-up head and transported to an open-bodied truck or the like wherein the entire bulk container, through manipulation of the pick-up head, is tilted and the contents or citrus products therein are emptied into the open-bodied truck. In order to accomplish material handling of the containers, numerous devices have been developed which include the use of a boom structure attached to the truck or the like having a pick-up head movably attached to the end of the boom for engagement and grasping of the container as set forth above. Numerous and generally complicated and complex structures have been devised and are currently being utilized to accomplish this material handling.
Representative of the prior art of the structures described is the disclosure set forth in the U.S. Pat. No. 3,447,705 to Stone. Therein, a pick-up and dump mechanism is disclosed utilizing a fluid actuated pick-up head for grasping a container, raising the container to the open bed of the truck and tilting the container through manipulation of the pick-up head and therefore the attached container, such that the citrus contents pour out of the container when in its tilted position and into the open bed of the truck. The container is then replaced in its original position, and all of the handling of the container is done by the selective manipulation of the pick-up head disposed in supportive relation to the carrying boom or the like. As represented by Stone, various devices have been produced for the transferring of citrus and like fruits and generally handling such citrus products after picking. Such devices utilize both hand and power equipment but generally suffer from the requirement of utilizing substantial labor or workman time as well as being overly complex thereby adding to the maintenance. All these problems, of course, affect the cost of operation. While it is obvious that certain of the prior art devices which are now commercially available are certainly applicable to certain situations, it is frequently recognized that the equipment currently available is somewhat overly complex and in many instances unreliable.
It is, therefore, of course, highly desirable to provide a relatively simple, practical and efficient mechanism for selectively tilting or orienting a gripping head having a bulk container attached thereto wherein the orienting assembly to accomplish this positioning would be sufficiently structured to handle relatively heavy loads. Also, the structural design of such an assembly should be sufficient to maintain relatively low initial purchase costs as well as maintenance costs for the obvious reasons set forth above.